More than 6,300 financial professionals came together at Focus 2025 for four energizing days designed to maximize inspiration, education, and connection. Attendees had the opportunity to network in our one-of-a-kind Greener Grass Lounge, and many took the first step toward their goals by consulting with our LPL Business Solutions team. With a full schedule of 248 sessions, including expert keynotes and incisive breakouts, this year’s event was packed with essential insights to help participants realize their goals.

We’ve pulled out key insights from four of the most talked-about breakout sessions, then recommended next steps to pair your ambitions with our insights.

business professionals networking

Operate Like a CEO: Elevate Your Practice to the Next Level

Independent financial advisors need to do more than manage clients; they need to run a business. This session covered everything from fundamental leadership principles to strategies for streamlining processes and driving long-term success. Panelists shared real-world experiences, including:

  • Be different - In a crowded market, it’s critical that you and your clients know what differentiates you from your competitors.
  • Set goals for now and later - Goal-setting shouldn’t be all short-term or all long-term. Effective leaders define big-picture goals, then set shorter-term targets to help them get there.
  • Prioritization matters - It’s important to understand how different kinds of work impact your business, so that teams can prioritize the highest-value tasks.

Take Action: Start thinking like a CEO by gaining new business strategies with insights based on your financial data. Request a personalized KPI Report & CFO Consultation today.

short form videos drive 2.5x times more engagement than long form.

Harness the Power of Video Marketing

Good storytelling is key to building connections, and with an effective video strategy, advisors can connect with new prospects and existing clients at scale. Video accounts for 82% of all internet traffic,1 and this session was full of data-backed advice for making the most of it, including:

  • Keep it brief - Short-form videos drive 2.5 times more engagement than long-form.2
  • Prioritize progress over perfection - You will learn by doing!
  • Tell a story - Even educational or promotional content can and should have a narrative arc in order to connect with and engage your audience.
  • Guide your audience - Make sure to end your video with a clear CTA to nurture your audience to the next step.
  • Post in real time - With Social Patrol, LPL advisors can post videos instantly, with the peace of mind from knowing that their content will be archived and reviewed by LPL Compliance.

Take Action: If you’re ready to get started with video, or looking for more support, LPL Marketing Solutions can help you plan content, streamline content creation with DIY tools, or run your video strategy and execution end-to-end.

advisors who actively integrate financial planning see an 89% boast in client retention and a 64% increase in referral opportunities

Mastering Financial Planning Integration

With growing client demand across all asset levels, financial planning can be an important lever for growth. Advisors who take a planning-first approach have expanded their practices faster than their peers. This session provided strategies to enhance and scale your holistic planning and advice offering, while ensuring that planning offerings align with practice composition and business goals. Insights included:

  • Drive growth with planning – Advisors who actively integrate financial planning see an 89% boost in client retention and a 64% increase in referral opportunities.3
  • Focus on the future – Planning helps create a sense of stability by anchoring relationships and conversations in goals and life events, rather than unpredictable market performance.
  • Trust translates – By helping clients with a thoughtful and intentional transition of wealth, advisors also secure trust with the next generation.

Take Action: For advisors new to financial planning, or those looking to offer deeper, more personalized financial guidance without growing their payroll, LPL Paraplanning Services can provide in-depth consultations and even deliver detailed financial plans, customized for your clients.

business professionals having a meeting

How Profitable Is Your Practice?

Many advisors are held back by an unbalanced book of business, often without even realizing it. Yet on average, the bottom 50% of clients generate less than 4% of total revenue across LPL advisors.4 This session explored strategies for using LPL’s segmentation tool to analyze your book and improve profitability, with key insights like:

  • Think ROTI, not ROI – ROTI stands for Return on Time Invested and can help you assess the effectiveness and productivity of time spent on meetings, projects, or other tasks, so you can determine where time is well-spent.
  • Data is key – LPL Partial Book Sales’ DIY Segmentation feature can create an instant analysis of your book, including a look at the amount of revenue driven by each segment, as well as recommendations for clients to transition.
  • Right-sizing is possible – Once you’ve identified clients that aren’t serving your business goals, you can consider hiring an associate advisor to work with them, selling to another advisor, or leveraging LPL Partial Book Sales to transition them to LPL.

Take Action: Once you’ve identified your ideal clients, narrowing your book can help you increase your profitability, streamline your service model, and improve your quality of life. LPL Partial Book Sales ensures that clients transition seamlessly and continue to receive exceptional professional financial guidance.

business people talking

Keep Learning

If you’re looking to keep the momentum going, continue learning with our upcoming webinar series: Business Strategies for Success. You’ll get the opportunity to dig deeper into these topics, ask questions, and find out how to turn your “what ifs” into “what’s next?”

Register for Webinars

Footnotes:

  1. 200 key video marketing statistics and insights, Linearity, 2023
  2. Video Content Statistics in 2025, Kasara Designs, 2025
  3. Cerulli Profitability Study 
  4. Survey of LPL Financial Focus conference attendees, 2024

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